Tabu

Lamartine Babo dominated the early days of radio; a highly sophisticated composer, rooted in the samba tradition, he is best remembered for creating some of the biggest all-time carnival hits. Oswald De Andrade revolutionized Brazilian literature; in the twenties he was a leader of the celebrated – and subversive – semana de arte moderna in Sao Paulo. His mordant critique of Homo Brasiliensis culminated in the epic Macunaima, the most influential book of its time – and still revered as a turning point in Latin American literature. Joao Do Rio was a prolific journalist whose chronicles of turn-of-the-century Rio brought much chagrin to politicians and celebrities alike. He was the ‘incomparable archetype of those sinister times: mulatto, fat, and homosexual (sic)’. Júlio Bressane’s first major appropriation of the life of a popular composer – Lamartine Babo – gives him the chance to portray an imaginary encounter of those three geniuses. This ‘what if’ film gives Bressane plenty of material to, in his own words, ‘suggest a mixture of elements, of signs, erudite and popular, which will later be formulated by Oswald in his writings, and Lamartine in his songs, signs of Brazilian culture, tropical and anthropophagic.’ Lamartine is played by Caetano Veloso, arguably the greatest songwriter from Brazil of the twentieth century; Oswald by Colé, a wonderful if not appreciated comedian, a discovery of Alberto Cavalcanti; and the devilish Joao by José Lewgoy, the most celebrated character actor from Brazil; he is the host with the mostest. To see it is to believe it.